Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

A Chaotic Melody.

A Lifetime Achievement Award at thirty-six years of age.

Jiyong had expected an award after the organisers had begged him to show up, the coercion being necessary because he hadn’t been to one of these end-of-the-year shows in a long time. When he’d last attended, he’d been on stage performing a medley of his greatest past and current hits, receiving several awards. Album of the Year, Artist of the Year – the usual. Back then no one was as decorated, no one as revered.

And then Jiyong had stopped.

How many years had passed since? Seven, eight?

The industry had kept evolving in his absence – that was obvious as the award show played out. He sat in the artists’ section, alone, unenthusiastically swinging a generic lightstick that the organisers had handed out to attendees. He turned the lightstick in his hands, finding it decorated with the MasterCard logo.

For fuck’s sake.

He’d invented these – lightsticks. Who could have guessed they’d become such a hit? Their group had been the first to design their own, which to groups today was an unquestioned rite of passage. When he’d done it, it’d been something new.

He watched fans swing lightsticks of all kinds as one group after another performed.

The girl group PopUp received some cheers, followed by a boy group (Y)?b-X/o. Too much punctuation – it was giving him a headache. He’d spent the years of twenty-three to twenty-six with constant headaches.

“Sunbaenim!” an AI-looking boy said, bowing deeply as he passed by with a dozen bandmates. He gave them a wave, wondering who they were. Was it makeup, that uncanny valley face, or had this rookie gone through so much plastic surgery by age seventeen that he no longer looked quite real?

He twirled the lightstick, aware of cameras on him to catch each reaction. He had come here, back home, after a seven-year hiatus only to discover it was no longer home at all. Everyone knew him, but he knew no one.

Then, the award. It caught him by surprise. ‘Lifetime Achievement’ flashed on the huge monitors, and he thought the award was for someone much more senior, but then his face was projected before the tens of thousands gathered at the Hong Kong dome venue; his face when he had been nineteen, twenty-two, twenty-seven. When he had been six years old. They had footage of him as a child – dancing, performing. He’d started young.

Too young.

“I didn’t expect this,” he said into the microphone and meant it. He hadn’t been on stage like this in years, and his ears were ringing, the lights blinded him, and bile burned the back of his throat.

He’d been so goddamned confident in his early twenties – this would have felt like a piece of cake to him then. Where was that Jiyong? Where had he gone?

Yet he felt enough distance from his surroundings to speak. An out of body experience as he thanked his fans for all the years they’d spent together. Outside this bodily existence, he was looking down at himself in wonder.

Thirty-six wasn’t a lifetime. That was, if anything, half a lifetime.

He’d been coaxed into attending to be told his time was over, that he’d done enough for the industry, so could he now please retire and just go away. After this, people could clap their hands and say ‘ah, I grew up listening to his music’ and wipe away nostalgic tears, because he was a thing of the past, a relic, surrounded by these child-idols who were anywhere between fifteen to twenty years younger than him.

He was finished.

“Thank you again,” he said, bowing a full ninety degrees and, bitter as the award felt, he held the bow longer than was needed, because he did want to thank his fans for all that they had endured together. He had loved them, as they had loved him, and he would never get to thank them again.

He left the stage, still floating somewhere above his physical form.

The organisers couldn’t have been more timely in giving the award to him then. It was, after all, the last day of his life. How had they known? How had they guessed? It came together so beautifully, poetically, that he couldn’t have composed it himself.

A lifetime achievement award on the day he would kill himself.

His life always had been a poem, a song.

A chaotic melody.

Jiyong’s mother had passed away a year earlier, at sixty-four from lung cancer. She’d never smoked. He’d spent the final month at her bedside, with her determined to pass down family recipes to him although he didn’t cook. When she was no longer able to speak, it was her laughter that he missed the most.

Jiyong’s father had died of heart failure a few years after his debut. He’d been abroad at the time and flown back for the funeral to console his inconsolable mother. The paparazzi had harassed his relatives, and him, outside the funeral hall, trying to get a picture of him in tears. He’d learned that nothing was sacred and flown back out the day after to resume his overseas schedules. His father’s death hadn’t really sunk in until one morning when he’d wanted to call him because he suddenly missed him, only to realise that his father had died years ago.

He wouldn’t have settled on suicide if either of his parents was living – he couldn’t do that to them. He could, however, join them in the universe, as whatever particles they all became. His particles would join the endless cacophony of existence, and it would not make a difference if he did so at thirty-six or seventy-six.

He wondered, distantly, if he was severely depressed. He had been depressed in the past, but this didn’t feel similar. There was no despair, no hopelessness. There wasn’t even that numbness and indifference.

He was fed up. Yes, that was it: fed up.

Maybe it was the drug allegations that had done him in. He was too smart to touch drugs at this point of his career, having learned from close up how this destroyed public figures. Did the police care? Not at all – Sungjoon had been caught smoking weed, after all, and if one member had indulged, then they all were smoking some. Logical conclusion, right? The police thought so.

Jiyong could have understood false drug allegations when their group had been at the height of their fame and everyone’s attention was on them, but he’d been summoned by the police years into his hiatus. What, did the public miss him this much? That they had to invent crimes just to drag him back into the spotlight?

Blood samples, urine samples, hair samples. Nail samples.

He’d been interrogated for hours. Were you at this party? What drugs did you take there? Who gave you the drugs? How much did you pay? How much did you take? Why are you lying? Look, let’s start again, and please focus this time. Were you at this party? What drugs did you take there? Who gave you the drugs?

To this day he didn’t know who’d tipped the police off with the bogus charges.

He’d already wanted to kill himself then, when he was summoned to the police station to the delight of hundreds of paparazzi filming every second of his arrival and departure. He’d felt so unreal, with Kafka come alive around him, that suicide felt like a realer option than continuing to live was.

Suicide while under investigation, however, would have been interpreted as an admission of guilt. He’d refused to give them the pleasure.

The scandal had gone on for five months before the police finally announced they were dropping the charges due to a lack of evidence. Just like that – not even a ‘sorry for the inconvenience’. No one really cared for his innocence; what people remembered were the paparazzi shots taken of him entering and exiting the police station.

Now the entertainment industry was awkwardly welcoming him back, ignoring that they had firmly shunned him during the scandal. A lifetime achievement award? Fuck you.

His hands shook in his lap during the drive from the venue back to the hotel.

He squeezed his hands together, blinking rapidly, breathing fast. A burgeoning panic attack. He’d been having them since his enlistment. He closed his eyes, shivering, focusing on the breathing exercises that helped calm him down.

And, just for tonight, a new mantra: fuck you. Fuck all of you.

He was thirty-six and more tired than he could ever articulate. He no longer looked forward to the decades ahead but rather woke up each day with the same question: what next? What kind of bullshit would they invent for him next? Drug charges – failed. Plagiarism accusations, all throughout his career – all disproven. Bullying accusations – also failed; he’d never even met the people accusing him of terrorising them in middle school. Middle school!

He couldn’t live waiting for the next scandal to erupt. Did he have an X on his forehead? Why? Because he’d been more successful than anyone?

“You win,” he muttered, squeezing his hands together. Ah, this – mumbling to himself. Another trauma symptom, Dr Gu had told him. “You win.” His shoulder twitched, a compulsive jerk racking his body. He breathed it out. “You win, but I finish it.”

The intercom of the limousine crackled. “Jiyong-ssi? We’re here.”

They drove up the Four Seasons driveway, and Jiyong exhaled with relief. His last journey, and he had completed it.

You did enough, kid. You did more than anyone.

Rest now.

Jiyong had enough medication to kill one of those fifteen-member newbie groups, he was sure of it. Pills to manage his insomnia, his depression, his panic attacks, pills in white, orange, and pretty pink, all issued out in small dosage bags. Take one set in the morning, another at night, Dr Gu had advised him for years before finally retiring to mind his rare orchid collection.

He’d started with the sleeping pills a decade ago. Each year he’d graduated to more prescriptions, his mix of drugs so complex he couldn’t even tell anyone what he was taking anymore. He doubted Dr Gu could have listed them all either.

And so his task in the hotel suite on the forty-first floor was simple: take a week’s worth of pills, then go take a bath and just… fall asleep. How easy it would be. How simple. How graceful. His manager would find him in the morning – they’d been together for twelve years now, and to him he addressed the suicide note on the hotel writing pad: Doyoon-ssi, thank you for all you did – you worked hard.

He didn’t add ‘I love you’, because Doyoon knew that without needing to be told. Doyoon was on a very short list of people he loved – each year the list had gotten shorter as there were fewer people around him that he could trust.

He drew a bath.

It was half past midnight.

Four Seasons was by the waterfront, and he had a view across Victoria Harbour. The district of Tsim Sha Tui glittered across the bay with ships and ferries crossing the dark waters.

Jiyong had been to Hong Kong more times than he could count, but he’d never visited it properly – he had never gone out to a neighbourhood joint serving yum cha, never tried that coffee-tea drink Hong Kong was famous for, had never ridden the iconic trams or climbed one of the mountains in search of the perfect view. Just this: hotels, venues, cars, then back to the hotel again. From the age of eighteen to now, just this.

It was his doing, too: he wanted to remain in the safety of hotel rooms, not having to worry about who was following or filming him. On his last tour years ago, staff had frequently organised outings for him on days off, worried that he never left his room anymore. Jiyong-ssi, don’t you want to go to a museum? Jiyong-ssi, don’t you want to go for a boat ride?

He’d been grateful for their care and gone to the places they’d suggested. Now, however, he would have chosen the locked hotel room.

Blame it on age, then. Blame it on all the things that had pushed him to go on hiatus.

He emptied a week’s worth of pills into a glass, numb to how many he’d have to take.

The bath was nearly full. He turned the faucets off.

He wouldn’t undress – being found naked seemed grotesque. What to wear? Boxers and a t-shirt or one of his striped pyjama sets? He couldn’t decide.

He had a group chat with his members. There’d been five of them once, way back when they’d all been bright-eyed and bushy-tailed: Sungjoon, him, Youngbae, Daesung and Woojin. Two had left them – Sungjoon leaving the group after the drug scandal and Woojin jailed for illegal gambling and profiteering.

Five candles. Two snuffed out.

What a leader he’d been to them.

Sungjoon, a fifteen-year-old underground rapper – the best amongst them but who never felt quite at ease as an idol. Sungjoon never stopped being amazed at his luck and always thought he was unworthy of the love given to him. Jiyong could hear his deep voice now: when we one day retire from this business, Jiyong-ah, I’ll become a painter. I’ll buy a house out in the country, and I’ll go around as an old, hunched over man with grey in my hair and smudges of paint on my fingers.

Jiyong laughed at that. Hyung, that’s your plan?

It’s a good plan, right? And when you come visit me, all wrinkly and grey-haired like me, I’ll pour you a drink, and we’ll talk about the good old days. You’ll come visit me, won’t you?

Of course – where would I be if not with you?

A few months after leaving the group, Sungjoon had been in that car accident outside Wonju. What had Sungjoon been doing in Wonju? He’d tried to brake, the forensic evidence showed, before driving off the bridge. Sungjoon hadn’t been trying to kill himself, they concluded, but Jiyong had never quite believed that.

Sungjoon-hyung. Your particles will find mine, won’t they?

“Hyung, I miss you,” he said, settling on his red-and-white striped pyjamas. He’d started talking to Sungjoon a few years ago and, once he’d opened his mouth, had been unable to stop. So what Sungjoon never said anything back? So what.

Our eldest. I tried to lead you, but I guess I wasn’t up to that task.

congratulations brother, Youngbae had sent him.

Daesung had added, lifetime achievement well earned, hyung

Jiyong sat on the edge of the hotel bed. A group chat of five, then four, now three. thank you, he sent. I love you now and in the stars

He switched his phone off after that, nodding slowly. It was right to say his last words to Youngbae and Daesung, the people who had always stayed on his list of people he loved. He had a sister who would mourn him, but who would also inherit his billions. She would be comfortable; that was his apology to her.

As for brothers, Sungjoon he still loved – of course he did. Woojin, however, had turned into someone none of them had recognised. It was me. He’d taken a wide-eyed, impressionable Woojin to a casino in Macau, just a short hop over, after a concert there. Woojin had loved the casino – the excitement, the glitter, the rush. They’d just started getting really famous back then; the money had been rolling in.

Fast forward five years, and Woojin had gambled away the apartment he’d bought for his parents in Gangnam. His cars, his jewellery, and all of it. Woojin had gone into business with so-called entrepreneurs who’d flattered him as a genius businessman and then conducted illegal business in his name. Woojin had gone to loan sharks to cover his losses – not to him, or Youngbae, or any of them. They’d already become estranged.

And the girls, god the girls – an endless rotation of them. Girls hadn’t paid much attention to Woojin before he’d become famous, and his ego never recovered from that. No amount of fame, fortune, or wealth could satisfy that endless greed eating Woojin alive, to become richer, to become more powerful, to become untouchable. He wanted to prove he could get any girl at all, and once he had her, that he could treat her however he wished. Woojin, the party boy – Woojin, the king of Gangnam. Woojin, jailed for four years.

Woojin. A boy from Seoul, just like him. Not the most natural of talents, but he’d worked hard to make up for it, and then the success had killed whatever good had been in him. Woojin – I don’t think I can love you, not anymore. The boy sleeping in the dorms with me died years ago, before Sungjoon even. Woojin became someone he couldn’t recognise.

And yet it was their maknae Woojin who was sitting opposite him in the hotel room, wide jaw set, a smirk on his lips. “Jiyong-hyung,” Woojin said, something dark to his tone. “You always thought you were so much better than me. Admit it now – at last.”

Jiyong shook his head. “No, that’s not… It’s what you feared we thought of you.”

“Bullshit!” Woojin pointed a finger at him. “You always treated me like I should be grateful to be in the group with you, you arrogant, conceited son of a bitch! You were the genius, you were the songwriter – you doubled as a solo artist while the rest of us stayed at home twiddling our thumbs. You treated us like we were, what, your fucking backup dancers? Fuck you. But look who’s the washed-up loser now, huh? Look who’s sitting here all pathetic, counting pills. About time you fucking kill yourself.”

Woojin spat on the floor – Jiyong saw that he did – but nothing landed on the pristine, polished marble tiles. How could that be? Jiyong blinked, and Woojin was gone.

Jiyong took the regular nightly dose of six different kinds of pills. He didn’t need water to wash them down – like candy. The glass still had seventy-eight pills in it. That was a lot to get through.

Go take a bath – swallow them one by one. Go to sleep. It will be so easy. Go say hi to your mother, your father. God, his dad didn’t even know he’d become this famous! Didn’t even know he’d won Artist of the Year more than once. Go, hurry to him – tell him all about your amazing career, of the lifetime achievement award. Say, ‘Appa, as soon as they gave me this reward, I ran to you. Appa, aren’t you proud? Appa, do you remember me? Appa.’

It was half past two. How? Already?

The bath water was lukewarm.

He needed one last cigarette.

The Four Seasons had an infinity pool on the roof, the untouched surface glittering from the underwater pool lights. The lift had brought Jiyong up to the rooftop doors and, turning the handle, the door had opened. Someone had forgotten to lock it for the night. This seemed like a sign.

Jiyong was in his red-white striped pyjamas, his black hair overgrown and curling around his head. But he looked good, even in oversized pyjamas – he had concluded this when taking in his reflection in the lift mirror. He wasn’t as handsome as when he’d been twenty-six and weighed ten kilos less, but he still had those soft eyes and the innate charm, even if not the knife-cutting jawline. He’d pulled the hotel bathrobe on top, the belt dragging on the ground, and in his hand was a glass with seventy-eight pills.

The far end of the pool touched the edge of the building, with the three remaining sides decorated with lounge chairs and closed parasols. A rooftop bar was across the pool from him, and he wondered if he could get one last drink there without setting off any alarms. He decided not to risk it.

He sat down on one of the lounge chairs close to the doors and lit a cigarette. His hand was shaking, but smoking calmed him down. He listened to honking far down at street level, and at the noise of helicopters flying in the dark where he struggled to spot them.

A plane crossed the sky.

They’d have to fly his body back in a coffin. Doyoon would take care of it, he supposed.

His hand moved to the glass, then to his mouth.

Seventy-seven. See? It was easier out here. The suite had been claustrophobic. Seventy-six. Seventy-five.

He finished the cigarette, stubbing it out on the chair.

He liked this: the open air, the hum of the city. Seventy-four. Should he go into the pool? That would work, too. Which was better? Found unresponsive in the bath or Found unresponsive in the pool? Wasn’t the pool more rock ‘n roll? Hadn’t a guy from The Rolling Stones gone out that way back in the 1960s? He’d met Mick Jagger once; a cool guy who’d had no idea who he was.

Seventy-three.

Seventy. Three in a go!

He was so tired, was the thing.

What next? What would they come after him for next? He had to take control. Had to be in charge of his life.

Sixty-five.

What, five pills in one swallow? He was unstoppable.

His hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

He’d shown his face one last time – to accept an award, to show that they hadn’t won. To make them feel guilty for the hell they’d put him through – look at Jiyong-sunbaenim, still standing! Impressive, isn’t he?

And to thank his fans. He’d owed it to them, at least, to say goodbye. The loves of his life.

Sixty.

He’d had enough of life, now. Of everything.

Fifty-one. Wha, nine at a time? That was more like it! One more… Fifty! A solid, firm number.

His head felt heavy. His heart felt pained.

A few dozen more, then the pool. He’d float so nice. He’d sink so nice.

Rest, Jiyong-ah. You did so well. I love you. Rest.

Who was saying that?

“Sungjoon-hyung?”

The door to the rooftop opened, and a tall, well-built man walked onto the patio. Jiyong stilled. Faint recognition flashed in his mind – a man of twenty-five or so. Had an interesting, handsome face and the kind of jawline he’d used to have. Blond-dyed hair and intelligent eyes.

The man stopped at the edge of the pool, let out a shuddery breath, hands in fists. Trembled. He walked past the lounge chairs, mini-palm trees and the closed pool bar on the far side, steps rushed but unevenly paced. The rooftop was encircled by a glass wall that came up to the man’s chest. He stopped there. He’s taking in the views, Jiyong thought, sitting in the shadows in his pyjamas and bathrobe. I saw him at the show.

That was it – the man was also an artist and had been on stage that evening, performing and winning awards with his group. He’d seen him dancing. Singing.

Powerful.

The man stood still for a few beats, taking in the view before he looked around, went to the bar and picked up a bar stool. He placed it by the glass barrier, close to the edge of the pool. He was breathing heavily. It sounded like a panic attack. Jiyong should know.

The man climbed onto the bar stool – to stand on it, with the glass barrier now coming to his knees.

He was going to jump.

Jiyong dropped the glass and stood up, the clattering noise and spilling pills startling the man and nearly making him lose balance – right on the edge of the forty-fifth floor.

“Hey!” he called out, stepping out of the shadows.

The man, hands tightly in fists, hyperventilating, looked over his shoulder at him. They were equally surprised to see one another.

Jiyong faltered, mind spinning. Was this another hallucination? The man looked so real. “Get the hell down from there!” he said, stopping at the pool that separated them.

The man looked at him with disbelief. “JY-sunbaenim?”

“Yes?” he said, unfazed that the man knew him because everyone did. The man looked scared and somehow reminiscent of Sungjoon, fifteen years old, agreeing to join the agency as a trainee. The sweetest kid you could ever meet. Sungjoon had tried to brake, and so maybe he’d changed his mind at the last second, maybe he’d changed it, and that made it worse for Jiyong, that Sungjoon had tried to take it back but—

“Don’t play with your life like this – have you lost your mind? Get the hell down from there!”

The man was shivering head to toe, jaw set tight. He glanced towards the edge. “I— I just—”

“How old are you?” he asked, out of shock more than anything.

“Twenty-six.”

“You’re a year too early, then, aren’t you? No one’s ever heard of the twenty-six club.” Sungjoon had been twenty-nine. Not even thirty when he’d drowned. So had— “Brian Jones! God, that was it.”

“What? Who?”

“The Rolling Stones guy who drowned in his pool. See? But the twenty-sixes, no one remembers them.”

“I—”

“What’s your name?” he asked, slowly rounding the pool until he was on the same side as the man. This was how to do it, right? Keep them talking, just keep them talking. Fear squeezed his heart, adrenaline pulsing through him. “I asked what your name is.”

No response – what a kid, too: taller and bigger than him, the beefed-up idol type. Jiyong had always been, well, scrawny and underfed. Rock and fucking roll.

He passed the pool bar as he said, “I saw you on stage tonight.”

“You saw us?” the man asked. He looked devastated and beautiful in equal measure.

“Yeah, I— Wait.” He stared. Amazed. Disbelieving. “You guys won Artist of the Year. And Album of the… You won all the big awards and now you’re gonna kill yourself?”

He didn’t mean to mock this man, but who did that? The guy and his group were doing great! What was there to be suicidal about?

Then he recalled, quickly, winning those awards a decade earlier and returning to a hotel room so quiet, so isolating, and so far removed from the chants of his name that he’d felt like losing his mind. He had lost it, actually – waved bye bye sometime around 2020. Good on him for hanging onto it for that long, even.

The man was shaking – hyperventilating. Dear god, what had the industry done to these kids?

“And I’m just so tired,” the man exhaled, like that was the last breath he had in him. “God, I— I’m just so tired. I don’t have more in me.”

At this, icy dread passed through Jiyong. The man was going to jump.

“I understand that, I really do, but—”

But what? It’s gonna get better? There’s so much to live for? He didn’t believe in any of that.

“But what will your fans think?”

The man hesitated for the first time. What, had that actually worked?

“One day they will understand.”

Never mind, then.

The man turned back to face the view, making Jiyong curse and step closer, his hand stretched out. “Just wait! Fuck, come on, just wait! There’s fucking sunshine and rainbows and, and the smell of grass after it rains! The sound of waves coming in from the sea! Waking up in the arms of a lover, and the, the warmth of their skin. The sound of cats purring! Do you understand what I’m saying? There’s all of that, so come on, can you just—”

“I’m sorry,” the man said, staring down to the street below, and Jiyong knew it was dizzying, it had to feel dizzying, and he wasn’t close enough to reach him, he was too far to—

The man’s balance wavered, and the stool tipped, and the man jerked forwards with a startled cry, and Jiyong surged forward, had fabric in his fist, and pulled. He was hit with the heavy weight of a body, was falling backwards, was submerged in water.

Water. He floated.

He was calm, at peace. How pleasant. How tranquil.

Sungjoon-hyung. You drowned in that car, knocked unconscious by the impact – this was what they concluded because you hadn’t tried escaping.

But hyung, what if you just sat there, fully conscious? What if you sat in that sinking car instead of calling me to come get you?

You know I would have come get you. Sungjoon—

He came up for air, gasping.

The man was also in the pool, desperately pulling air into his lungs. The bar stool was lying on its side on the patio tiles, next to where the man was now pulling himself out. Jiyong swam to the edge but had trouble getting out – the bathrobe had gotten so heavy. He struggled to find purchase, straining to breathe. His hold on the pool edge loosened. He slipped back underwater. His head was heavy, dizzy, unfocused. He tried to get air in and breathed water instead.

Why struggle? He’d done enough. More than anyone.

He had things to tell his father. He had—

Strong arms slid under his armpits and hauled him above water. He was hoisted, with violence, out of the pool and onto the tiles where he dropped like a drenched dog. He coughed water from his lungs, weighed down by the fleece bathrobe, heart beating so fast that it hurt. In the next moment he threw up – a mix of chlorine water and pills in white, orange, and pretty pink.

He threw up more, water turning into slime and mucus, hacking as his lungs and stomach burned.

Drained, he rolled onto his back, wheezing.

They panted in the cool night air, next to one another on the patio floor.

God, it hurt to be alive.

“I’m Namjoon.”

Sungjoon.

Jiyong reached out for Namjoon’s hand, finding it wet and clammy, but warm – alive. He closed his eyes, exhausted. “Hyung… I finally saved you.”

Just once, at long last, he’d been where he needed to be.

Kings of Burnout.

“Have some orange juice,” Doyoon said, standing by the cubicle seat in first class. Jiyong, hand trembling, took a sip from the paper cup. Doyoon was aged forty-eight, father of two, round-faced, thick-necked, and he looked severely displeased. “I’ll call Dr Min for an appointment this afternoon.”

“Please, that’s not necessary,” he said, pinching the bridge of his nose. His nails were all different colours, yellow, red, white, with the press-on nails having survived him trying to claw his way out of a pool. He gave Doyoon his best ‘you’re being overbearing because I am fine’ look, perfected through their several years together.

Doyoon sighed, looked hesitant, but returned to his seat. Doyoon had been against the Hong Kong trip, saying it was too soon after the police interrogations for him to go back out there – Jiyong still hadn’t recovered, mentally speaking. But Jiyong had insisted. One outing, then rest.

Eternal rest.

Two more hours to Incheon. How was that for rest?

He closed his eyes, the airplane humming around him. How strange that the first day of a life he hadn’t planned on living was so ordinary.

Sungjoon-hyung, I don’t mean to keep you waiting.

Namjoon.

The man had left him there, on the rooftop. Could you believe that? Had apologised a dozen times, asking, “Sunbaenim, are you okay? Fuck, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to— Sunbaenim, can you breathe okay?” Rubbing at his back, worked up and contrite.

“You goddamned fool,” he’d sworn, pushing the hotel robe off and managing to get to his hands and knees, coughing so hard his ribs hurt. “You reckless idiot. What the hell were you thinking?”

He’d managed to sit, at which point the man had made his exit, bowing deeply and apologising.

“Hey, get back here! Hey!”

The rooftop doors had closed behind the man, and Jiyong had sat on the ground, drenched and disbelieving, but alive.

When Doyoon came to check on him further into the flight, he asked, “Do you know an idol called Namjoon? He’s in that group that won Artist of the Year last night. The what’s-their-name group.”

“Kim Namjoon of MES – everyone knows them,” Doyoon said, getting out his phone, typing, scrolling, and showing him a picture.

On the screen was the man from the pool – the man who had left Jiyong there, coughing and spewing, with bows of apology. Namjoon had looked more concerned about knocking him into the pool than about his aborted suicide attempt.

The man on the screen had a serious expression, looking into the camera with dark dragon eyes. There was no mistaking him: Kim Namjoon, leader of MES

“MES, right – that’s them.”

“It stands for mise-en-scène, which I believe is French for the arrangement of stage design but symbolises how the seven-member group wish to present their artistry to their fans. They debuted while you were enlisting – not a ton of success at first, but they really blew up maybe a year and a half ago, and it’s been one hit album since. They’ve really broken through internationally, too.”

“How do you know these things?”

Doyoon quirked an eyebrow at him. “Knowing the industry is my job, Jiyong-ssi. How are you feeling? You look clammy. Do you have a fever?”

He had to fight Doyoon off of him, promising he’d get rest as soon as he got home.

He spent the remaining hour to Incheon reading up on MES. Doyoon had been right: they’d spent the first few years without getting much attention, but with their second full-length album they’d been an overnight success. This was their second year in a row receiving the Artist of the Year award, after a remarkably successful and busy year with four comebacks, with each single going to number one in Korea, Japan, and numerous other countries. These boys had been working hard.

But: “I’m so tired,” Namjoon had said. Jiyong looked at their activities over the past few years and understood why Namjoon was exhausted. That was, after all, when you typically committed suicide: when you couldn’t see a future ahead of yourself anymore.

Where could a group like MES go from being number one? To uncharted waters. Who knew what you’d find there.

Jiyong listened to a few of MES’s singles and recognised many of them – he’d like this song whenever it’d played in public somewhere. Oh, this one too! And this one, not bad at all.

He read up on the group on kpop news sources and, inevitably, stumbled upon news on himself. Kwon Jiyong of Entire receives lifetime achievement award! Kwon Jiyong, songwriter, leader and rapper of iconic boy group Entire, made a rare appearance at MAMA this weekend to accept a lifetime achievement award. Kwon Jiyong made headlines earlier in the year after the Seoul Metropolitan Police—

JY’s emotional acceptance speech at MAMA! JY of Entire returned to MAMA after eight years where he was honoured with a lifetime achievement award. JY was visibly overcome on stage, sincerely thanking his fans. Entire, originally a five-member group debuting in 2006, was hit with setbacks in 2016 with the death of member and rapper Sung Sungjoon, and again in 2017 with the legal troubles of singer Han Woo—

The return of the king! JY of Entire accepted a lifetime achievement award at MAMA this Saturday. The group has been on hiatus since 2017, and JY is the only remaining Entire member who has not released new solo work during this time. Was his appearance at MAMA the start of a long-awaited comeba—

“Sir? You need to fasten your seatbelt – we will be landing soon,” the flight attendant told him. He thanked him and observed that the man was sexy. Wha, was he checking out flight attendants only twelve hours after a suicide attempt?

What a strange day to live.

Jiyong couldn’t possibly have attempted suicide at home – he couldn’t do that to his cats. How could he leave this world knowing his precious children would restlessly circle his body, meowing in confusion and fright? The thought broke his heart.

As he got home that day, he was greeted with angry meows, translating to demanding ‘where have you been?’s. The catsitter had sent him many pictures and videos, however, and he knew his cats had been nothing but spoiled in his absence.

“Appa had to take a short trip, that’s all,” he said, picking up Iye, who looked deeply displeased, tolerating his cuddles for a few pets before wriggling out of his hold.

The penthouse apartment was as he’d left it – eclectic and full of art and design furniture pieces collected over a career spanning nearly two decades. He felt eerie walking from one room to another, like a ghost who’d gotten stuck on earth. He had a view to the Han River and, across it, to Seoul Forest. Upon moving he’d thought he’d go running there regularly. He’d gone once.

“Sungjoon-hyung, what do you think?” he asked, taking in the evening view of the city. “Was it supposed to go like this?”

He restlessly pushed a hand through his unkempt hair, wondering where in this city was the man who’d pulled him out of the pool.

He showered, ordered food, and tried to understand still being alive.

Out of nostalgic wonder, he ended up in the living room decorated with eccentric, brightly coloured furniture. He put on one of their early albums from 2009. He’d written and produced every song on it. As he listened to the tracks that he still knew by heart, he scrolled through the social media channels of MES, watching the reels they’d put out on their Hong Kong trip. “One, two, we are MES!” the seven men chimed in unison in the most recent reel, doing some kind of synchronised hand gesture before waving at the camera.

Back in his day, a simple ‘yo, we’re Entire!” had sufficed – yes, they’d had an official greeting, but they’d forgotten it quickly. Everything was so polished now, in a way it hadn’t been fifteen years ago.

In the newest update, Namjoon stood in the centre of the group, giving the camera a confident smile. To think that hours later he’d been on the roof. On that stool. Struggling to breathe.

Jiyong studied him carefully, like this somehow could help him understand this man. What’d happened to him?

“—for the support you gave us during MAMA!” one of the members with a warm, heart-shaped smile said. “It gave us a lot of strength!”

Namjoon said, “That’s right! We had a really great time yesterday and look forward to coming back with an even stronger stage!”

“See you soon!” a painfully handsome one with broad shoulders said, and the seven members bowed out.

He tilted his head. Squinted. Played the reel again and caught it: ‘we had a great time yesterday’.

The reel had been taken that morning while Jiyong had already been on his way to the airport.

Wait. Wait, wait, wait.

Namjoon had tried to jump, then fled the scene, and by morning was filming Instagram and TikTok content? What the actual—

“That’s fucked up,” he laughed, because what else could he do?

Jiyong didn’t use Instagram for personal communication even as he liked to decorate frequent posts with carefully chosen, cutesy stickers that he thought his fans would like. Even so, he DMed the MES account that had 15.5 million followers, from his account of 25 million followers – the follower account had gone up significantly during the drug scandal. People loved nothing more than to hate someone.

He sent: On behalf of Kwon Jiyong, MES leader Kim Namjoon is invited to Song Lair Studios this Tuesday at six o’clock. Report to reception upon arrival.

Namjoon better still be alive on Tuesday.

He put the phone away, lit a cigarette, and held it between his lips as he poured himself a glass of bourbon. He exhaled the smoke before taking a long sip, relaxing on the couch. Iye jumped into his lap, curling up into a soft, purring donut and, for the first time in months, he felt a spark of joy from being alive. Just a spark – fleeting, passing, but he’d felt it.

Dread followed. He’d nearly… He’d been so set on it. To take back some kind of power – take back ownership of his life by ending it. Why? Where had the idea even come from?

One of their early hits started to play, with Sungjoon’s melodic, smooth rap filling the room and him with longing.

His hands twitched, then did his neck, then his head. Stress-induced, Dr Gu had told him. He breathed in, breathed out. Inhale – exhale. He was keenly aware of having gone from a stage and massive crowds back to his apartment, where he was alone. Isolated. Lonelier than he could say.

This was how he had lived his entire adult life.

He waited for his hands to cease trembling before taking another sip, calming himself by pushing his fingers through Iye’s soft, grey fur. He swallowed the bourbon down. Listened to Sungjoon’s voice. “You didn’t send this kid for me to save, did you?” he asked.

But Sungjoon didn’t respond. He’d been dead for eight years, after all.

Song Lair Studios were only a twenty-minute walk from his apartment in Cheongdam-dong – few in Seoul had a gentler commute. He had been making the trek hundreds of times since leaving his old company to join an agency that he co-owned. In that time he’d written hundreds of songs for his next album, discarding most of them.

He had, however, written songs for other people, seniors and juniors alike. He’d had three top five hits during his hiatus this way, not only in Korea but abroad too.

Maybe you should have been a composer instead of a performer, someone in his team had once told him, but they couldn’t have been more wrong. At age six, seven, eight: god, I want to be up there on a stage, performing for people. It’s my only dream! To be like Seo Taiji!

By age eighteen, he’d secured that dream. At thirty, he’d let it go.

His new agency took up two floors of a modestly sized Gangnam commercial building with a convenience store at street level and a luxury skin care clinic on the first – these businesses hid the agency a little and were also great for late night snacks and last-minute facials. His old agency had taken up an impressive, fifteen-storey building with dozens of artists there, and he had been their biggest star. When he’d finally decided to leave, he’d taken Doyoon with him.

Across the street from his new base was a Céline flagship store and a Michelin-decorated Italian restaurant where he liked to dine sometimes. He’d been surprised to hear it usually took two months to get a table – he was in the habit of walking in whenever he wanted a puttanesca.

Now he walked straight into the agency building, relieved that on this day no fans were lingering in the area. He soon reached his personal studio on the third floor that no one else had access to, sipping on an iced americano that he’d picked up from a small café on the way. The café staff never let him pay – not even during the scandal. He’d liked that and always carried around cash to tip them.

This, walking to the agency, getting his own coffee, all without security, would have been unimaginable a decade back. His hiatus hadn’t restored his anonymity – he would never regain it – but stepping back from the spotlight had helped him reclaim some of the things he had lost.

Soon on the large monitor was an open folder with the files for his first album since 2017. He’d thought that perhaps the album would be released posthumously, to coincide with his funeral or some such. One final chart topper.

But here the album still was, eight tracks nearly complete. He could finish off the project within a few weeks if he really wanted to – had been about to finish it that spring, but then the police had summoned him.

After that, his concentration was frazzled. The thought of releasing an album, doing promotions, performing again after a long hiatus – well, that was when the compulsive fidgeting and panicked breathing took over. That was when he thought he’d never perform again, and that was when he’d decided Hong Kong was as good a place as any to die.

He carded through his hair restlessly, but also felt a kind of peace that only his studio could elicit. Here, however briefly, the rest of the world faded away, and he was only snapped out of the editing when someone rang the doorbell of his studio. ‘Do not disturb Jiyong’ was an unspoken rule – who dared to break it?

The video intercom showed one of the receptionists and Kim Namjoon of MES in the narrow hallway. Two to six – obedient.

He opened the door, making Namjoon bow so fast and so deep that he nearly hit the moving door. “Sunbae—”

“Come in,” he said, ushering Namjoon inside, and giving a nod to the receptionist who’d escorted him.

Namjoon stepped into the studio, and Jiyong was disturbed by how tall the man was. Namjoon handed him a gift bag with a deep bow, not having looked at him once. “Scented candles. I— It’s an arbitrary gift, I know, but I don’t know how to apologise so I—”

“Take a seat,” he said, taking the gift bag and adding it to a small pile of unopened luxury gifts sent his way from brands who hoped he’d wear their stuff in public. Namjoon sat down on the oversized red armchair, looking around the studio but seemingly feeling too uncomfortable to look at him.

Jiyong sat in his work chair, turning it to face the visitor. “So,” he said, crossing one leg over the other, hoping to exude confidence but he was already fidgeting, pulling on an invisible piece of thread on his trouser leg. He rubbed at his throat nervously with his other hand. “Still alive, then.”

Namjoon flinched and, before he could stop him, Namjoon got down onto his knees on the studio floor. Namjoon bowed until his forehead hit the ground. “I’m so—”

“Alright, you’re very sorry, please get up. You’ll make me very uncomfortable if you keep apologising.”

Namjoon got back on the armchair with a contrite and embarrassed look shot his way. This kind of apologetic behaviour from the confident man standing in the middle of the seven-member group felt wrong somehow.

Jiyong chewed on the inside of his cheek, taking the man in – ‘kid’ or ‘boy’ came to him because Namjoon was ten years younger than him, but what had Jiyong been doing at twenty-six? World tours as a solo artist. Twenty-six – you were grown by then, and Namjoon looked grown too. Charismatically handsome rather than an instant beauty; manly rather than dainty. A long nose, monolidded eyes, and plump lips.

“Well,” he said, feeling his shoulder twitch. Namjoon noticed. He cleared his throat. He hated that people could see the way his body acted out, and he could do little to control it. “I thought it’d be nice to see you when we’re not drenched.”

Namjoon opened his mouth, closed it, opened it. His voice was deep and warm, but hesitant. “I’ve never tried to… before. I just— I was in a state that night, all worked up that I just, just snapped or. To be honest, I never planned to… I just thought I’d stand there. Does that sound crazy? That I just wanted to stand there?”

“I’ve heard crazier things in my time,” he said, crossing his hands over his knee.

Namjoon didn’t look at him as he spoke. “But when I tripped, I— My life flashed before my eyes, it really did. My family, my members… and I knew I didn’t want to. I hope you’ll believe me when I say that.”

“I see no reason not to.” Sometimes you had to stand on the ledge to realise you wanted to step back down after all. That you wanted to hit the brakes. “Now you know, then, right? That you don’t want to.”

Namjoon nodded, and Jiyong watched him taking in the full award shelves decorating the place. Namjoon couldn’t be about to jump in front of the next bus if he was that curious about his studio.

“Something must have set you off that night.”

Namjoon nodded but said nothing.

Jiyong rubbed at his temple. “When did you last take a break?”

Namjoon’s gaze snapped back to him. “A break?”

“When did you last have a day off, I mean.”

Namjoon looked searching. “Maybe a few years ago, for my grandfather’s funeral.”

Fucking hell, Jiyong would have jumped too. Jesus. (“Hyung, don’t take the Lord’s name in vain,” Daesung would have told him, kindly.)

“Well, that settles it. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

Namjoon looked curious. “Who? Youngbae-sunbaenim?”

He smiled – everyone loved Youngbae, as they should. “Not quite.”

Jiyong read the gardening magazine in the empty waiting room, wishing he could smoke there. He’d tried quitting so many times and eventually just given up the struggle.

Namjoon had been with Dr Min for nearly an hour and a half now. He was starting to get hungry. Should he order some fried chicken to the psychiatrist’s office?

He put the magazine away, pulling the pink faux fur coat more securely around himself. This kind of style made him more easily recognisable, of course – no normal office worker was walking around Seoul with a pink fur coat on. At some point in his life he’d put on jeans and a t-shirt and tried to look like everyone else, hoping this way he’d be left alone.

He'd still got recognised in a heartbeat.

And so he’d given up on trying to blend in. Just accept it – he couldn’t take the fame back, could he?

The clinic was closed, but Dr Min was staying in late as a personal favour to him. He didn’t know Dr Min well yet – the replacement of the retired Dr Gu. He’d known Dr Gu’s quirks, but with Dr Min he didn’t know where to start. The thought of bringing her up to speed on all of his shit seemed exhausting, even if she had thoroughly read his files. He liked her – she seemed very no-nonsense. Even so, he’d barely worked with her yet.

The clinic was eerie at the late hour, and he looked around restlessly. “So this is where the crazies come… Who, me?” He pressed a finger to his chest, tilting his head in wonder. “Well, it just might be. It’s certainly a possibility.”

He uncrossed his legs and stood up when the office door finally opened, with Namjoon and Dr Min stepping out. Dr Min smiled that patient smile of hers, wishing Namjoon a good evening – it was almost ten o’clock. “And I’ll see you next week,” she said, and Namjoon bowed her way politely. To him, Dr Min said, “Jiyong-ssi, you know the pharmacy at the corner, I trust?”

“Like the back of my hand.”

“Then, goodnight to you both,” she said with a calmness that made Jiyong believe even he could pull himself together one more time. Dr Min would have been devastated if he’d actually done it, and he felt sorry for her.

Namjoon looked at him with an awkward air, clutching his prescription.

“Let’s go,” he said, showing the way.

As they exited the building, he wrapped the faux fur coat around himself tightly, the end of the year in Seoul cold and chilly. “Well, share with the class – what have you got?”

Namjoon walked slowly, comfortably a head taller than him. What did they feed trainees these days? He’d have to ask around.

“She said I’m suffering from burnout and have an anxiety disorder.”

“Ah. Good.”

Namjoon gave him an affronted look.

“Well, it could have been clinical depression. It’s all comparative, you’ll learn that with time.” He walked with his hands crossed over his chest. “Still, I’m not saying you have it easy. You can’t sleep, can’t eat. You’re consumed by hopelessness, disengagement, lack of motivation, and you’ve been arguing with your members and the agency about the most ridiculous things, only to realise that you’re struggling to care, but then an hour later you’ll be hyperventilating and panicking out of nowhere.”

He had Namjoon’s rapt attention. “Were you… were you eavesdropping?”

He puffed out his chest. “Come on now, kid, you’ve come to the king of burnout.”

Namjoon smiled – it was the first time he’d seen the man smile, and it made him feel warm. Namjoon had dimples; the fans must love that.

He waited outside the pharmacy while Namjoon picked up his prescription, wrapping a thick woollen scarf around his head to hide his features as people passed him. He’d grown up in front of the nation – to this day, even teenagers recognised him. How? They’d barely been walking, let alone talking, when he’d been winning his first daesangs.

He moved in a circle, unable to stand still, rolling his shoulders and fixing the scarf over and over again.

“You have to go to your appointments – just popping pills isn’t enough,” he said, sagely, when Namjoon returned.

Namjoon looked hesitant before explaining he wasn’t sure if he could make the appointments – their schedules were so full, and coming to the clinic every week wasn’t realistic. He listened to this explanation, astonished because Namjoon didn’t get it.

“Namjoon-ssi. You have to take a break from work. You do realise that, don’t you? You need to go to your managers and ask for time off.”

Namjoon balked. “I couldn’t poss—”

“Not doctor’s orders, but JY-sunbaenim’s orders. Tell them that and see what they make of it.”

A young couple passing them were looking at him. Were they looking at him? Intensely, invasively. They’d take five more steps and then get their phones out to get his picture.

“I’m starving. Don’t you think you owe me dinner?” he prompted.

He’d been right, the boy was taking his phone out. He turned his back on the couple and started walking down the street, Namjoon following. Let them photograph his back, then, and send it to all their friends with ‘we passed JY in Gangnam!!’ It’d been eighteen years since his debut, so why did he even care anymore that people thought his life was something for them to film and distribute, like a TV show they were watching in which he was not a real person but a concept?

“What do you feel like having?” Namjoon asked.

“I’m partial to truffles but sujebi will do.”

Namjoon didn’t want to talk about the light topics of suicide, anxiety disorders, or medication, which was more than fair, and although Namjoon must have been tired after his session with Dr Min, he still conversed with eloquence and insight, showcasing a broader than average vocabulary.

“You must read a lot,” he observed.

“Ah, I guess I do,” Namjoon said, the two of them sitting upstairs of the family-run sujebi spot. At this hour, only a few people were there, and they were too drunk to take heed of them. “I mean, you’ve got to read if you want to be a rapper.”

“True,” he agreed, enjoying their conversation about how they wrote lyrics. Namjoon, too, kept a notebook handy just to write down ideas, phrases, words.

Back when Jiyong had debuted, no idols had written their own music – no, no, you left that to the company professionals. He’d been the first idol to write and produce his group’s music and been mocked for it. What, couldn’t their company even afford real producers? What a bunch of losers – Entire would go nowhere, that was for sure.

Those haters had gone awfully quiet when the daesangs started rolling in.

Now Namjoon spoke of songwriting and producing competently, and he was glad that the industry had carved out space for talents like himself.

As he sipped on the soju, his fidgeting lessened, and the twitching of his fingers ceased. He felt calmer, steadier. He knew Namjoon had noticed the stress-induced tics but had said nothing of them.

After a pause in conversation, with Jiyong wondering if they should order more soju, Namjoon said, “Can I, ah, ask for a favour? For a picture. Because the members, they freaked out when they saw the DM inviting me over, and they’re big fans, and I, well, promised.”

“Sure,” he said, and Namjoon held out his phone to capture the two of them in the frame. Jiyong did the peace sign.

“Thanks. Oh, this came out well. I’ll just show it to the members – I won’t upload it anywhere.”

“What’d you tell them? About being invited over.”

Namjoon hesitated. “That I ran into you in the men’s room at MAMA, and we had a nice conversation about music.”

“Well, I can tell you’re a rapper – you can think on your feet, and creatively too.”

Namjoon grimaced, finishing his soju – turning away from him whenever he took a sip, which made Jiyong feel old. He didn’t mean to make Namjoon feel bad about lying – if he’d even half-considered jumping off a building back in the day, he absolutely couldn’t have told his members about it. He was the leader and others relied on him. How could he say he was tired? How could he say he’d had enough?

The leader couldn’t say such things, and that was how you ended up on the roof.

Namjoon wiped at his mouth, clearing his throat. “I’ve been meaning to ask… Is it because of burnout that you’ve been on hiatus so long? If I may ask, I mean.”

He sat up straighter, unease filling him. “Well,” he said, carding through his hair restlessly.

What to say that was socially acceptable? That their group had been winning all the awards and been the most successful kpop act ever, and then Sungjoon had died. Sungjoon died, and something broke in him that could never be fixed. He could say that, maybe, and add that he’d gone on a global solo tour three months after the funeral. That was crazy. That was something only a completely disassociated person could do. He couldn’t remember any of the tour now, and he’d visited nineteen countries during it.

Or maybe he could say that it was Woojin’s crimes that had pushed him into hiatus. Or no, should he say it was the enlistment that had followed losing two of his brothers that had done him in? When he, half-out of it, had suddenly been in the barracks where everyone tried to watch him shower so they could sell information on the placement of his moles to fans online?

That was when he’d started having panic attacks for the first time, like symptoms of a deadly disease that he’d ignored for too long.

He’d missed being in high school, then, when Youngbae had fought off the bullies for him. Hey, JY, you’re fucking rich, won’t you pay for your fellow soldiers’ dinner? So he’d paid for dinner. The following week he’d offered his black credit card in advance – take it and pay for your meals, I don’t mind. JY, you son-of-a-bitch! You think you can flaunt your wealth like this? You think we’re losers with no money? How dare you treat us like this?

He couldn’t win. Week after week, the other soldiers had kept tearing into him.

He’d needed Youngbae in the army to fight the bullies off.

But he’d been alone.

“I guess it’s not my business why you disappeared,” Namjoon said when he’d been quiet for too long.

“Disappeared. Isn’t that too harsh?” he asked in a wondering tone.

After returning to civilian life, he had been doing endorsements, modelling for fashion houses, been on magazine covers, expanding his businesses, and writing songs for other artists – he’d been out of the public eye for a two- or three-month stretch at the most. That couldn’t be called ‘disappearing’, could it?

Yet he knew what Namjoon meant – that he’d finished enlistment five years ago and still hadn’t released new music. He’d been in hiding.

“I have an album,” he admitted.

Namjoon leaned closer. “You do?”

“Mm, it’s just… it’s rising, like bread dough. Like ciabatta. How will it taste? I wonder. Is it fluffy, is it airy? Is it fresh? I wonder.” He gave Namjoon a sheepish smile. “We’d scheduled a late summer release, truth be told, but then I spent all my time with thorough officers from the narcotics unit. Had to postpone. Had to rethink.”

It was past midnight, but that clearly wasn’t bedtime for either of them. The restaurant was closing, however, and he paid for the meal. He’d been kidding when telling Namjoon to pay, but they still fought over it.

“Pay next time,” he said but wondered what on earth a ‘next time’ could be. He’d done his part – dragged Namjoon to see a professional. It was what Sungjoon would have told him to do, and now he’d done it.

The streets were quiet. Jiyong said he’d walk home – a half hour’s journey at a leisurely pace. Namjoon protested, saying he’d walk Jiyong home, and that made him laugh. What was he, a damsel in distress? He’d lived around here for years. He liked walking at an hour like this, when most people were asleep. He did a lot of songwriting in his mind on walks like these.

“Still, it’s cold,” Namjoon said, looking at his scarf distrustfully. “Do you have a hat?”

“You’re very gentle,” he observed.

To his surprise, Namjoon looked flustered – blushed, even, ever so slightly. His brain stalled, a cautious warmth entering the edges of his consciousness, but quickly blurring with the soju.

“I’ll let you walk with me to the intersection, how’s that? Also, put your phone number in here. You have your own secret phone, I assume?”

His breath rose in the air, and he liked the shapes it made against the dark night sky. He’d walk off some of the soju, take a lower-body bath, get in his pyjamas, and sleep with his cats on the bed with him. Another day when being alive hadn’t been half bad. How odd. Could he expect more of these decent days?

They were almost at the intersection. “Sunbaenim?”

“Mm?”

“Why were you on the rooftop that night?”

Ah. Smart and calculating, this Namjoon. “Me? I was taking some nighttime pictures of Hong Kong.”

“You were?”

“What else?” he asked.

What else?